Mad in Pursuit Notebook

Postcard Printing Processes: Black & White Views

Understanding the printing processes used to produce postcards can help you describe what you have and will help establish value. Below are samples of various printing processes from postcards scanned at 2400 pixels per inch, so you can see the tiny detail in the grain.

Do it yourself: Once you know what you're looking for, a good magnifying glass will show you what you need to know. A 15x jeweler's loupe will allow an even closer inspection.

Photograph

An image is printed directly on to sensitized paper from a photographic negative. All view postcards are based on original photographs (using photo-mechanical methods, below) but "real photo" postcards are in a class of their own. As you can see below, photographs are the gold standard in terms of fine grain, providing beautiful, detailed resolution. The film grain is nearly microscopic.Real Photo postcards were often unique images, not meant for mass distribution.

Photo-mechanical processes

Images were made by rendering a photograph onto a printing plate by various means, for mass production.

Collotype. In full commercial
use by the 1870s, this "photo-gelatin" method produced a very fine
grain, sometimes indistinguishable from a photograph by the naked
eye. Impressions were limited to 1500 to 2000 before the gelatin
printing surface deteriorated. They were quite common in postcards. The sample
below (from a 1914 French postcard) shows the highly reticulated
grain. The Albertype (USA) beneath it is a variation of the
collotype.

Photogravure. Introduced in Vienna in 1879, a
copper engraving plate was sensitized photographically. They were beautiful,
but expensive. And the steel facing of the plate would wear out after
about 1000 prints. I haven't seen any postcards from this process.
(The sample below is not from a postcard.)

Platinogravure. The sample below is from a French postcard of
Lourdes. What do you think? From what I can gather, Platinogravure is a brand name for a French reproduction
process. I would have assumed it is a variation on photogravure, but
the texture looks screened.

Halftone. Popular after 1894, halftones were produced from a photographic negative processed
through a screen onto a grid of variably sized black and white dots.
Easy, cheap, not very beautiful because of the relatively poor
resolution. (Sample below, from a White Border era postcard,
1915-1930, USA)

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